New Zealand Social Media's April Fool Day Darlings

That's a real pie blended up!

It's April 1st today, and all over the country New Zealand Marketing peeps rejoiced as their carefully crafted April Fool's content was scheduled to hit our newsfeeds.  All those hours of work released for us to see and hopefully have a good laugh at.

Tonight I'm compiling a list of the ones I liked the most from the morning madness.

First up in the food category has to be I Love Pies and their awful looking mince and cheese smoothie.  I mean, I guess if you heated it and ate it as soup, it wouldn't be too bad...but still nicely done to them!  You can see the whole post here

Tip Top's Foraging Range

Second up is Tip Top Ice Cream, who's new Fruju ice blocks looked like they would hit the pavement faster than hitting the spot.  Kale and Coconut was not too far away from believable but the Cauliflower and Walnut one sounded and looked revolting.  You can see the posts here and here

Pic's Really Good Peanut Butter offered up a double lidded glass jar, so you can always get to the last of the Pic's.  Genius!  You can read more here

And while we are on breakfast spreads - Boundary Road Brewery came up with their own answer to Marmite - a Pilsener Lager Yeast Spread.  That might have been a bit of a winner methinks.


While we are on breweries Mac's beer came up with a bottle you open from the bottom, so it has a more "wine glass" feel.  I can't see how that would go wrong.  Meanwhile Good George came up with a drone for local beer delivery - where do we sign up fellas?

Pak n Save Supermarket got in the spirit of April Fool's as well.  Introducing a new Pak n Shave service where you can buy food and get a hair cut too.  I must admit though, that when I read "Get the chop while you shop" my mind went elsewhere.  Maybe a thought for next year guys!

Well it was super fun watching my newsfeed this morning and I hope you enjoyed reading along.  Did you see these ones?  Did you see anything that I haven't covered here?  Comment below! 

If you live in New Zealand and have need of Social Media Content Management for your business, visit www.kmedia.co.nz to see our offerings or contact us directly at info@kmedia.co.nz for pricing and more information. Follow us over at https://www.facebook.com/kmedialtdnz

September 2014 Instagram Challenge

Suddenly September and Spring is in the air. Christmas is on my mind, hence the delay in getting this blog out!    In fact September is sliding by before my very eyes.  Nevermind, it's definitely time for some Instagram fun.

  And so as always, a new month brings a new Instagram challenge.  Thanks to all those that participated last month. 

Here is the September challenge:

I clearly had summer on my mind when I selected these ones! 

It's another 7 day photo challenge, and a fun networking opportunity for you and your business.  Join in, do one during the month or all seven - whatever suits you best.  Think of it as a fun way to increase the content that you are sharing on your Instagram channel.  Taking part will give your customers a behind the scenes look at your business' fun side.  

I'll be checking in on all our participants and I will be sharing any note-worthy entries month-to-month as well.  So look out for those updates too.

If you live in New Zealand and have need of Social Media Content Management for your business, visit www.kmedia.co.nz to see our offerings or contact us directly at info@kmedia.co.nz for pricing and more information. Follow us over at https://www.facebook.com/kmedialtdnz

Top Tips for Google +

Google Plus is sometimes seen as the poor cousin of Facebook.  But with 540 million active monthly users, you can not ignore this social media channel if you are in business.  And the fact of the matter is, many G+ users are not on Facebook.  While on a high level, the platform will have many similarities, you will find that the interactions and things shared on G+ have a different look and feel too. 


Here, I thought I would share some helpful hints and tips about using Google+ which I have been collecting over the last couple of months.  The tips below have helped increase my own engagement and follower numbers as well, in an organic way.

Use the Search Tool

It's Google and what do they do really well?  Search engineering!  So use the search function.  You can use the search function to look for people, pages or posts.  So search for topics that match your interests or business and then engage and interact with those posts and pages.  This will help get your name or brand out in the G+ world, and will help increase your followers in a relevant but organic way.

Mention

Use the ability to mention other companies and brands on G+ to increase engagement and following.  If you go to a local cafe and they are on G+ maybe post a photo and a mention about your visit.  If there are brands that would work well with what you are doing, then build a relationship.  In general, you need to give some love to get some.

Communities

There are tonnes of community circles out in G+ land.  Search them out and join them.  Start to interact.  Post topics on the community.  Reply to people's posts.  You will see a much greater return of +1s and interaction if you post to communities than when you put a thought out into the public stream.  Or another way to see it - stop shouting into the wind and go to a clubrooms to chat instead.

Trending or Hot

Like anything, if you keep an eye on the trending or what's hot items going on then you'll be able to tap into that and increase engagement that way.  This will show people that your brand is up with the play, and will ensure your business page appears fresh and active.

Hashtags

G+ will actually give your post some hashtags that it deems relevant to what you have written, but these aren't always relevant because it's an algorithm assigning them.  Help it out by adding some yourself.

Images

Images are usually a good draw for engagement no matter what the social media asset is.  This is no different over at G+.  Use full sized images.  A big trend there is GIFs as well.  If it moves and is funny or awe-inspiring in some way, then it catches people's attention as they scroll through their stream feed.  Those GIFs get quite a lot of interaction as well.

If you use some or all of these six handy hints, I'm sure you will see an increase in engagement and follower numbers in the near future.  If you have any other hints or tips you would like to share, please leave a comment below.  I look forward to adding to this list! 

If you live in New Zealand and have need of Social Media Content Management for your business, visit www.kmedia.co.nz to see our offerings or contact us directly at info@kmedia.co.nz for pricing and more information.